The Prowler Legacy
by ialwayswantedtobebrave
Summary: Harmony Prowler is the daughter of the only Victor of District 9, Alexandria Prowler. The time for the First Quarter Quell comes around. Harmony is chosen as the tribute by her district and must face the 25th Hunger Games. Can she live up to the Prowler Legacy?


This is a story that has long been in development. The main character, Harmony, was literally screaming in the back of my subconscious to write her story. This is the result. Please leave me feedback in you reviews! I greatly appreciate all of you taking the time to read this story! Thank you so much! See you next time!

~Katie

Ch. 1-The Announcement of A Lifetime 

Being a Victor's daughter has never put the odds in my favor. I always knew that the day would come that I would face the arena. I've grown up with that idea since the day I turned twelve. For five years I was prepared to make the walk to the platform when my name was called but it never happened. This is my final year and I had hoped that things would happen the way they had in recent years. But then the announcement for the first Quarter Quell came.

Since it was required of all citizens of Panem to watch, my family had sat down in our living room to watch President White make the announcement. He stood speaking at the podium dressed in one of his always impeccable gold suits as a small Capitol boy stood next to him dressed in pure white clothes holding a box. I remember braiding Melody's hair as she sat on the floor in front of me and not paying attention because I had a feeling that whatever they had planned for these Games was just as cruel as the last. Who cared if it was the first Quarter Quell…what else could they do to make them more brutal? I had looked up when I heard my mother gasp and my younger brother Justice let out a scream of a pure horror.

"What? What did he just say?!" I asked franticly looking to and from both of their faces. Mom just shook her head at me.

That was when little Melody quietly muttered, almost under her breath, "He said that this year's Games in order to remind the districts that their own were slaughtered during the war, the citizens shall pick their own tributes." She then looked up at me with eyes filled to the brim with tears. She is so young but yet she understood. The districts will pick their tributes that will enter the arena.

My mother is currently the only victor of District 9. Before she was reaped she lived in the Bend, with the rest of croppers, harvesters, farmers, plowers and sowers. She had been a harvester by the time she was eight because her family needed the income. Her mother had died of one of the multiple sweating sickness outbreaks that occur frequently in our district. She had won her games out of sheer luck but in the process she had had to kill her fellow tribute.

Mom's arena consisted of canyons and rocky plateaus that had small batches of forests in between. Many tributes of the tributes that year died falling to their deaths trying to reach the rivers that ran between the ravines. Mom had the common sense to follow the layout of the land until it sloped to a point that she could climb down safely and thus have easy access to food and water. That also helped her escape the horrible thunderstorms that the Gamemakers decided would add to the excitement of the Games. Several tributes died of electrocution that year thanks to that "creativity".

In the finale of her games, Mom knew that she had to go up against her fellow tribute, Cyrus. She was not the favorite to win. Back home in District 9, Cyrus came from a family in town that shared their wealth throughout the district. People generally liked him better than my mother, who was practically a no body. Their mentality was imagining how much of his victor spoils he would share with the rest of them. They didn't have a chance to find out.

Cyrus had witnessed the entire bloodbath and been responsible for half of it. The bloodbath of the 5th Hunger Games is a "crowd favorite" because of the number that were slaughtered by only three of the "Career" pack. Cyrus had been lucky enough to be asked to join the Careers considering he was from an outlying district. He had accepted hoping it would better his chances. In the short run it had but it cost him his sanity as well. By the time the finale of the Games came about he was completely insane.

My mother had stood a fighting chance considering her skill with a bladed sickle. She had been lucky enough to grab one before the bloodbath had started because of her quickness. But her skill only got her so far. Cyrus's attacks were merciless and sporadic with his broadsword.

The time came for killing blows. Cyrus skimmed Mom on her right side, making enough contact to draw blood. She was already bleeding from a broken nose from a punch to the nose. She was swallowing her own blood. Cyrus was taunting her and telling her how once he killed her, he would drink her blood to absorb her strength and other frightening things that forced me to have nightmares as a child.

Clutching her right side with her left hand she lifted her sickle and maneuvered around to the back of Cyrus. He was too slow to notice the movement before it was too late. Mom only told him two words as she placed her sickle around the edge of his neck. As she delivered the striking blow that beheaded him, she whispered in his ear, "I'm sorry."

No one knows that detail but me. After a replay of her Games when we were little I asked her what she told Cyrus in his ear. She had shaken her head at me and told me to forget it. But I keep pestering her for weeks until she relented. After she told me I understood why she cried at night while dad held her when she thought we weren't listening. She felt guilty for taking the life of a fellow district citizen-let alone a life at all. She told me it was a guilt that every Victor had to live with-the fact they survived.

I know now with this announcement that I may have to live with that guilt. People may wonder why but I know that there is no chance that I won't be chosen to be in this Games. My mother is hated too much so it makes sense that her oldest child would be picked. Another thing that will just sell in the Capitol if I am picked to be tribute will be the fact if I will be able to live up to my mother's legacy.


End file.
